Michael "Ffish" Hemschoot

Michael "Ffish" Hemschoot (born 1972, Aurora, Colorado) is a director, animator and has held a variety of roles as a visual effects artist in major Hollywood films. Since 1996, Hemschoot has worked on films such as Mars Attacks!, What Dreams May Come, The Matrix, Hollow Man, Black Hawk Down, Minority Report and National Treasure.

He was lead animator on the films Bless the Child and Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, which was nominated for Best Visual Effects at the 76th Academy Awards. Currently, he is CEO at the animation studio he founded, Worker Studio, and is also a partner in the live action production company, Travelin' Productions.

Early life and education Hemschoot was raised in Parker, Colorado, but moved to California, where he attended California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) in the early 1990s and graduated from their Character Animation program in 1995.

Career Teaching and early films He has worked with visual effects companies such as Warner Digital Studios, Creative Visual Effects, Inc., Manex Visual Effects and Asylum Visual Effects. After his relocation to Colorado, Hemschoot was an adjunct professor of animation at Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design.

He started his career in film in 1996 when he was "2D roto artist" for Warner Digital Studios on Mars Attacks!. He then was an animator in a number of late 1990s films. In the 1997 film Batman & Robin, he was the digital compositor. He had the same role in the 1998 film What Dreams May Come. They soon completed two short films together: A Night at the Zoo in 2008, starring W. Earl Brown and Bridgers, then The Birthday Present in 2012, starring Joey Lauren Adams.

In 2017, he directed and edited the three minute short animation Camping à la Bergman. As of 2018, he and Bridgers were co-directing and producing the narrative documentary around the life of World War II hero and photo-recon pilot John H. Ross, John Ross: American, with Travelin' Productions and Worker Studio developing. He also edited the project, which is an animated documentary.

Artistic influences In an interview with Oxford American, Hemschoot stated that his film sensibility was formed by the works of Hal Ashby, John Sayles, Sam Peckinpah, George Roy Hill, and Walter Hill, and his later influences include Alfonso Cuarón, Lars von Trier, Alejandro González Iñárritu, and Walter Salles.

For a 2014 article, Hemschoot selected five animated performances that influenced him creatively: Bill Tytla's "Chernabog" from Fantasia and Stromboli from Pinocchio, Milt Kahl's "Shere Khan" from The Jungle Book, Glen Keane's "Professor Ratigan" from The Great Mouse Detective and John Lounsbery's "Tony" from Lady and the Tramp.

Filmography